Guitar Chords For Beginners - The C Chord

Many people want to learn how to play guitar but might think that all of those strings and frets are just too much to tackle. Fear not, because with just a few easy guitar chords for beginners, you can be playing many of your favorite songs in a very short amount of time!

Today we're going to discuss the open C chord which is one of the standard guitar chords for any player. Just for review, if you are a beginner, here is the basic layout of the guitar.

Every standard guitar has six strings on it and they are tuned usually (or standard tuning) to the corresponding notes:

E, A, D, G, B, E

Along with normal music notation, you can also use a numbering system known as guitar tabs that will assist you in seeing the finger placements for your chords.

Each guitar string has a number associated with it beginning from the highest sounding string to lowest. The high E string is normally recognized as the #1 string. So the order of string numbers looks like this:

#1 = E (high), #2 = B, #3 = G, #4 = D, #5 = A, #6 - E (low)

Now that we've got our string numbers dialed in, let's start working on playing our open C chord. Here is the most common way to play this chord.

Step 1 - Place your first finger on string #2 (B) on the first fret.

Step 2 - Place your middle finger on string #4 (D) on the second fret.

Step 3 - Place your ring finger on string #5 (A) on the third fret.


With all three fingers in place, give your guitar a strum. Congratulations! You're playing an open C chord.

It may take a little bending from your fingers to make the curl around the neck of the guitar but keep working on it and you will find it getting easier and easier.

The open C chord is one of the great guitar chords for beginners because it has such a warm and rich sound. Many songs begin with this chord (i.e. Dust In The Wind) so if you continue to practice playing it, you will have a great starting point to launch into other chords that are right near by.

Here are some bonus tips on playing the C chord that will have you impressing all of your friends!

Tip #1 - Start by playing the C chord and then remove your ring finger from the 5th string. You are now playing an A minor 7 chord that makes the sound more haunting and moody. Go back to playing the full C chord and you will notice the sound becoming brighter again. It's a nice contrast.

Tip #2 - Start by playing the C chord and this time take your pinky finger and place in on string #4 (G) on the third fret right next to your ring finger. It makes the chord sound a bit higher as you have just played a C sus (suspended) chord. Now take your pinky finger off and you will be playing the C chord again.

Practicing those fingering moves from the C chord to the Am7 chord to the Csus chord will allow to begin to build a great foundation of chords to work with. As with any guitar chords for beginners, practice will make you a much stronger player. Good luck and enjoy playing!